Before we get started it is important to understand a few things about this type of training. Jiu-Jitsu is a competitive sport but it takes a team to help you grow and improve. No one trains alone. In order to benefit the most from your training team you should work with those who have the same type of purpose and goals as you do in your training. Find partners who want to practice in the same way you do. In jiu-jitsu 101 this won’t be as big of an issue as it will be in the later. However at some point it is nice to train with many different body types to truly expose yourself to the art in its fullest.
White To Blue
1. Build on a solid foundation. In the beginning the most important thing is to get exposure to several moves from each common situation in jiu-jitsu. You want to feel that you have at least one goal in mind to attain from each common position or situation. Take your time and become comfortable with the different body mechanics and the awkwardness of jiu-jitsu. Positional dominance is extremely important. You need to develop a very strong positional game that allows you to control your opponent with little effort. One of the greatest qualities of jiu-jitsu is the ability to control an opponent, wear him out and then submit them. Without learning to properly control your opponent and wear them out, submissions will be very difficult to accomplish. If you were to begin lifting weights for the first time, you should always start light, learn proper posture and technique as you slowly build into more resistance or weight. It is the same with jiu-jitsu. Learn proper posture and technique and slowly build into more resistance. An important part in this phase of training is also to become familiar with how one move or position relates to another. Not only do you want to know how to pass the guard but you want to know what to do as soon as the guard is passed. Otherwise, your opponent will probably get the guard right back.
Blue To Purple
2. As you have come to build a solid foundation for yourself, it is now time to pursue the techniques that come the most natural. Exposure to new techniques is always an important part of Jiu-Jitsu but becoming proficient in what you know is much more important. You will never learn in one year as many techniques as you did your first year of Jiu-Jitsu but you will learn many more details that enhance those techniques and your overall game plan. Your goal right now is to begin drilling those “comfort moves” and make them work with little thought and effort. This is how you really begin to build your own personal foundation. Knowing the moves that work best for you and making them work better. Take the time to analyze your game and see which moves you tend to rely on. These are the moves you want to drill. There are many ways to drill your techniques. To learn more on drilling, visit clinchacademy.com and click the IJJ Game Plan link. Through drilling your goal is to better understand each technique. Learn ways to set them up and develop the proper timing and energy of each technique.
3. Now that you know which moves work well for you and you are in the process of making them better, you need to learn other techniques that can compliment your moves. For instance, if I have a sweep I like to work from the guard (lets say the windmill sweep) than I should find another sweep that goes well with it, like the omoplata sweep. Now I have 2 sweeps that compliment one another making each one a better sweep. If I take those two sweeps and look for submissions that go well with them, like the arm bar goes well with the windmill sweep and the omoplata goes well with the omoplata sweep, than I am developing a much bigger threat and a greater chance of success. This really begins to start a vicious chain because now that I know those submissions work well with those sweeps I can begin to see what other submissions work well with the arm bar and omoplata. The chain just keeps growing and growing and all the questions and problems that may occur while you are practicing your original move (the windmill sweep) are being answered and taken care of. Now you know that when ever you go for the windmill sweep, which is a move you decided was natural for you, you have all these other tools ready to use if your opponent defends. This is how you get and stay a few steps ahead of your partner on the mat. You should eventually dissect each position this way.
4. On top of constantly sharpening the moves you are good at, you should be paying attention to your weak areas. Maybe now you have a great guard sweep but you can’t escape the mount for anything. You should put your self there and become comfortable being under someone’s mount and from there improve your escapes. If you are comfortable there, there is no hurry or panic and when there is no panic, there is technique. There are basically 3 moves you should be practicing all the time, the ones your good at, the ones your bad at and the ones you don’t know. Most important are the first two. A lot of times 2 and 3 are the same.
5. Jiu-Jitsu training is no different than learning math. The basic stuff is not that complicated but once you get into long division and so forth...it takes some extra work. If you study and do your homework, you will succeed in your goals but if you only learn in the class room, your potential will never be what it could be. It is important to be studying different approaches and options for your self. For instance, if you are bad at escaping the mount, you should be asking your teacher for ways to improve, looking on the internet and reading books to try and find an escape that makes sense to you. You should come to the open drills class with a goal and some techniques in mind. Try different things and see which ones give you the best result.
Purple To Brown
6. Just like any other sport, Jiu-Jitsu has different plays. If you ever participated in other sports like foot ball or basket ball than you know it is rare that the team just plays a full game in practice. Practice is meant to sharpen up the finer details of the over all game. Coaches have their players run drills during practice, not play games. These drills are usually plays that give you purpose and direction in specific situations. With out purpose and direction, there is no efficiency. As you begin enhancing your technical level, developing plays is crucial to your success on the mat. Unless you are an advanced student rolling with a beginner, submissions don’t come easy. With plays you are learning to distract and mislead your opponent so that you can reach your final goal...the submission. Making plays can be accomplished easier when you have worked with step 2 for a while. Step 2 is the beginning of making good plays because it already links techniques together. In order to develop them into plays you need to create strategies that set them up well. Timing, accuracy, preciseness and composure are key words in this stage. I would actually encourage you to start a play book. Using the techniques that you prefer, create a play book that develops specific plans of action in different situations. You can use a spider web format of some sort.
Example:
Be sure to take notes as well. Here you can see that we start with the windmill sweep which can easily transition into a knee bar, an omoplata or an arm bar. The arm bar can easily lead to a triangle, omoplata or right back into the windmill sweep. You would want to take notes on how you get from a windmill sweep to an arm bar...You could just jot down on the connecting line something like (opponent hugs my head). This way you know that if you go for a windmill sweep and your opponent hugs your head to keep from getting swept, you can transition into the arm bar.
If you see the red route on the web example, you can tell that this sequence goes right back to where you started. At this point you could take a different approach. For instance, you start with the windmill sweep, move to the arm bar, back to the windmill sweep and then to an omoplata which has its own continuations. Sometimes writing things down really puts them into perspective. It can make your path more clear. Give it a shot. Take notes on it and write down strategies.
Brown To Black
7. By the time you have reached your brown belt, you should really feel comfortable with all aspects of your jiu-jitsu game. Some areas may still be your bread and butter and that is fine but you should feel pretty comfortable in every situation. Maybe your just really good at turning every situation into your bread and butter. The journey from brown to black is very personal in that it should be about perfecting your own game or style of jiu-jitsu. At the same time you should be able to adapt and utilize other styles of jiu-jitsu. Remember those old kung fu movies that had styles like monkey, tiger, dragon or even drunken master! Jiu-jitsu has different styles as well. Chances are you have a very specific style of jiu-jitsu that falls under a very specific category. I have heard people use different names for different styles of jiu-jitsu but you can even make up you own name for it if you like. There is an article which speaks of “Elemental Jiu-Jitsu” which divides jiu-jitsu into four groups:
1. Earth
2. Water
3. Air
4. Fire
It is a great article and helps you to begin understanding different styles of jiu-jitsu. You can find it at the jiujitsu brotherhood blog site which is linked on the Clinch Academy members page. So from brown to black you are really developing your own style while exploring others as well.
Black to Infinity
8. Now that you are a black belt you should have such an in depth understanding of the different aspects of jiu-jitsu that you can freely share with others your jiu-jitsu philosophies, strategies and journeys. Your jiu-jitsu should have its own life and personality to it. You literally should have your own style of jiu-jitsu. Having your own style is very important and as you teach others you shouldn’t try to make them do your style but teach them how to learn and develop their own. You will find that the process of this game plan never ends and that in once sense you are now back at the beginning. You will learn new things about the basics all the time and should strive to do so. This is an infinite game plan!
More thoughts
9. This has been a process of evaluating yourself, setting goals and making a plan to achieve them. This is an ongoing process in your training. If you stick to this process, you will excel quickly. I have heard Randy Couture say that every time you show up to practice, you should strive to get 1% better. If every time you come to practice, your game increases by 1%, you will be 100% better in no time. That’s a great way to approach your training. I say you should strive to get 1% percent better every day whether you come to practice or not. Think. Study. Meditate. These things will help you grow, even when you can’t train on the mat.
10. One last important concept is to learn to focus on your breathing, your attitude and your intentions. I emphasize a lot on technique because Jiu-Jitsu is a very technical art but the mental aspect of the game is still huge. Technique only goes so far when it comes to training at a high level. It is a crucial part of the game but if you are rolling with someone as good as you and they have better cardio, your technique won’t matter in the end. You will be to tired to apply it. It is the same with the mental aspect. If your technique is sharp but your opponent has better control over his mind before and during battle than it is more likely that he will over come. You burn up so much energy when you can’t control your thoughts. Whether it be nerves before a fight, panic when in a bad situation or even excitement when in a good situation, these thing all take there toll in the end. You must learn to keep a cool mind. Only with a cool/calm mind can you act precisely.
Learning to breath is a huge part of controlling your mind. If your can breath calmly, your mind and your heart will be calm as well. If your mind is not calm, neither is your heart or your breathing. So when I grapple, I know when my opponent is excited, worried or whatever by how they breath. No matter what, they will soon be tired. Learn to control your breathing in order to control your mind.
Another benefit of this is that it helps you learn to self coach. Self coaching is very important aspect of grappling. To be able to talk your self through bad situations in a calm positive manner is what is going to get you out efficiently. Instead of thinking things like, “oh no, he’s passing my guard and he’s going to hold me in side control.”, you should be thinking things like, “Ok, he is under hooking my legs and I need to get my hips out to recover.” The first thought was panic while the second is positive self coaching. Self coaching also helps to keep your mind calm. So good breathing and a calm mind help you to self coach and self coaching helps to maintain good breathing and a calm mind.
Conclusion
This is a basic game plan that should help you excel in your technique as you grow to be a more complete and creative grappler. As you grow and learn your own style it is also important to remember that it is still impossible without a team to truly grow. Although jiu-jitsu is individual in the ring, it is a team effort in training. Training is where we spend most of our time and so we must remember and be grateful to our teammates always. We are all here to help each other grow and become the best grappler’s we can be. In your creative path, it is also important to remember that art, such as painting, has a free spirit to it. Even in this free spirit, there are still many rules and guidelines. A painter will not paint well with out using the proper tools, techniques, order and blending rules. So although I am encouraging you to be creative, I am also encouraging you to learn the basic concepts of leverage, technique and balance. This is our core. We are all on one mission, which is to explore, express and expand the art of jiu-jitsu.
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